Canon has developed a sensor for shooting FullHD video, capable of shooting in almost complete darkness

The full-sized 35mm CMOS sensor is designed exclusively for video recording. Due to this, there are not very many pixels on it, and their sizes are much larger than in the Full-Frame sensor of the camera. The aspect ratio of the matrix is ​​16: 9, so, strictly speaking, these are not standard 35mm, but its area allows the use of lenses with Canon EF mount .

When creating the sensor, new noise reduction technologies were used. This allowed us to achieve outstanding results - a camera with such a sensor can shoot pretty high-quality color video under illumination of 0.01 - 0.05 lux.

A camera with such a sensor can clearly and in color photograph a person’s face, lit by the glow of a smoldering incense stick. The image taken on a moonlit night looks as if it was shot during the day. A person with the naked eye is able to see stars up to 6 magnitudes in the night sky , and with the help of a new sensor, stars up to 8.5 can be photographed.

Judging by the fact that a prototype camera with a new sensor will be presented at the Security Show 2013 , which is being held in Tokyo from March 5 to 8, the Canon intends to use the new ultra-sensitive sensor primarily in video surveillance systems. In addition to them, the company’s press release mentioned applications in the field of astronomy and medicine.

Unfortunately, a video demonstrating its capabilities has so far been published only in low resolution, so it’s difficult to assess the potential of the novelty for artistic video filming. If the image is of high enough quality, it will be possible to shoot scenes with very dim light sources, such as candles, without additional lighting and very expensive ultra-fast lenses like Carl Zeiss Planar 50mm f / 0.7 , created by order of NASA for shooting the back of the moon.



Source - Canon .